Libertas
by Tabari Avaren
Summary: On June 1, 1997, the Wizarding world must bury the greatest symbol of the Light since Merlin. On June 2, the war will begin in earnest. This is an effort to precreate the world and story of Rowling's final book.
1. Prologue

**Prologue**

Of the two hundred-odd students who usually returned home on the Hogwarts Express at the end of each year, perhaps a few less than one hundred fifty actually boarded the scarlet steam engine on June 1, 1997. Many had returned home shortly after Dumbledore's death; more had returned directly with their parents following the fallen headmaster's widely-attended funeral. Those who did choose to ride the train home – or were faced with no other option – clambered into their compartments with significantly less good cheer than was the norm at the end of term.

For one thing, it was not strictly the end of term; Hogwarts, if it were to run by its original schedule, had another three weeks before classes would be formally over, and even after that there were usually several days of rest for an exam-exhausted student body. As it was, war and politics and terrified parents were to bring all the students home even before the Examiners from the Wizarding Examination Authority could administer the O.W.L.s and N.E.W.T.s.

Yet there was some laughter, some hope. The war had not yet so jaded the children that all could see the thestrals gleaming in the late spring sunlight, and even after funerals, even looking forward to a long and hellish war, children are inclined to laugh at the end of term, especially when the sun is high and a perfect breeze is blowing through compartment windows, ruffling hair and playing cards.

With a clatter and a bang, the engine leapt forward from the station. The train would be accompanied by a contingent of Aurors, both in the compartments and above, on brooms; a significant Ministry presence also guarded King's Cross, where, hours before the train was even due to arrive, hundreds of parents would assemble to see home their children. Even the parents of Muggle-borns had been informed that something was awry, and so the mothers of Dean Thomas and of Dennis and Colin Creevey, and of Hermione Granger, would wait tight-lipped and terrified beside the robed fathers of Lavender Brown, and Ernie MacMillan, and Daphne Greengrass, united if only briefly in a fellowship of worry.

Upon arrival of the school train, these crowds would disperse quickly, for fear hung heavy upon all assembled, and none wished to linger as evening grew increasingly dim.


	2. Chapter One

_Author's Notes:_ This fanfiction was originally intended to be a roleplayed game. Unfortunately, the game never got going properly. My plot, however, and my ideas for characterization - and my burning need to tell this story - translated themselves into the beginning of this fanfiction. I hope to finish it before the seventh book is published, but even more, I hope to finish it - for it will be the longest, greatest endeavor of fanfiction I'll ever have made.

Thank you. All reviews are, of course, welcome.

* * *

**Chapter One: At the Dursleys' **

8:00 a.m., June 2, 1997

With a start, Harry woke. He had been dreaming, again, of the Tower and the Cave. He had seen Dumbledore's face again: pale green in the eerie light of the potion; unnaturally peaceful at the foot of the Astronomy Tower. He could not think, for a moment, what it was that had woken him.

Then he realized. Hermione Granger was busy, bustling about tidying up the room. She was halfway through retransfiguring her makeshift bed back into the two chairs she'd borrowed from the kitchen table, and with her typical noisy efficiency had set about bringing them downstairs. With a groan, Ron Weasley – whose own transfigured bed looked distinctly more like two chairs molded together – rolled out from under his coverlet.

"Hermione," he wailed. "It's four in the morning!"

"It's eight, Ron," Hermione said with a sniff. "And I hardly think it's polite to lie about all morning. Mrs. Dursley might need help in the kitchen, and it's only fair of us to offer as she didn't know we were coming."

"Aunt Petunia probably thinks you'll turn the toast into toadstools," Harry said with a yawn, but he too got out of bed.

Hermione was already fully dressed in a neat skirt and blouse, so Harry surmised she'd been up for a while. "Give me a mo, Hermione, and Ron and I'll be down."

"I'll just go see if your Aunt would like any help, then."

Rolling his eyes as she departed, Harry rifled through his trunk for a pair of clean jeans and a tee-shirt. To his pleasant surprise, he'd grown again, and the jeans – which he hadn't worn in months – actually fit without him having to roll up the cuffs. Ron was still taller than him by head and shoulders, but it was pleasant to know he wasn't abnormally small any longer.

Yawning and groaning the whole way, the two boys descended after a few moments, Harry taking care not to step on the squeaky stair out of habit.

Hermione, it transpired, had not succeeded in persuading Petunia to let her help. The horse-faced woman was standing protectively in front of her toaster oven, a look of deep suspicion on her bony features. "I do know how to work a toaster, Mrs. Dursley," Hermione said helpfully. "I'm Muggle-born, after all, my parents are dentists."

"Blimey, is that a toaster?" Ron exclaimed, and Hermione visibly winced. "That thing Dad's always going on about?"

Dragging his feet like a drugged mountain troll – and, indeed, Harry often saw little difference early in the morning – Dudley entered the kitchen.

Then he froze. Clearly Dudley had forgotten about the "guests" at Number 4, Privet Drive, and as his face turned from pink to white to green, Harry had to stifle a laugh. If Aunt Petunia were being paranoid, if Uncle Dursley had taken to carrying about his golf club even into the shower, well, that was _nothing_ compared to Dudley.

"Hi, Dudley," Hermione said brightly, though Harry could tell that even for Hermione, politeness to Dudley Dursley was a chore. "I'm Hermione, remember? I was just going to help your mother with breakfast."

"Oh, no you weren't!" Petunia exploded, her cheeks flushed. She had a wooden spoon in hand, and she waved it menacingly, like some odd parody of a wand. "You can get out of my kitchen! I won't have you _freaks_ ruining my appliances with your – your – your unnaturalness!"

The kitchen went very quiet, and Hermione looked as if she might cry. Ron seemed caught between laughter and concern, but Harry just sighed. "Let's go, you two. This is useless."

There really weren't very many places to go, however, at eight in the morning in Little Whinging, Surrey. If any of them had had bikes, Harry might have suggested riding into the center of town to find a place to eat, but Dudley had ruined his only bike when he was fourteen, and Harry didn't have any Muggle money, anyway.

They sat outside together on the grass, their backs against the front of the house, and stared out onto the street. Mr. Prentice from across the street glared at the three of them, and Hermione giggled.

"God, do they really all think you're some sort of maniac, Harry?"

"Yeah, they do," Harry said uncomfortably, shoving his hands inside his pockets.

"I'm sorry, it's just so – funny," Hermione said before dissolving into laughter. "Being here. I always spend summers with you two to get _away_ from the Muggle world, and now, here we are –" She went quiet, suddenly, looking deeply ashamed of herself, and said no more.

For a long few minutes, they just sat together. It was still early enough in June that the mornings could be chilly, and Harry wondered whether he oughtn't to have worn something more substantial than a sweater.

After a while, Hermione spoke again, quietly enough that nobody but Harry and Ron would have a hope of hearing her. "Harry," she said, "What happens when you turn seventeen? To the Dursleys, I mean."

Harry frowned. To them? "Well… I'm not protected any longer," he said. "By the blood magic, anyway."

"Yes, but…" Hermione looked troubled. "Harry, I know why you aren't 'with' Ginny any longer."

Ron gave Hermione a look. "Change the subject, much?"

Hermione gave Ron a hushing motion before turning back to Harry. "Because you're afraid she'll get hurt, that V-Voldemort will use her," and she shuddered, "to hurt you. Well, what about the Dursleys? Why hasn't he ever gone after them?"

Harry's first reaction was to say that he didn't care about the Dursleys, but then he felt sickened. They were, after all his family – sort of – and he'd never really thought that they might be in danger because of him before. "I – I dunno. Maybe Dumbledore, I guess. Maybe it's part of the blood magic. I mean, if he can't harm me while I'm here, it stands to reason he can't harm them, either. Which I guess means that when I go, when I'm seventeen, he can come here and hurt them."

Ron looked annoyed. "Like you need something more to feel guilty about," he said grumpily, shoving his hands in his pockets.

"Well, I was thinking," Hermione said, with the same look she'd worn when suggesting the DA or S.P.E.W., "that while we were here, it might be nice if we, you know, did a little protective spellwork, to keep them safe while you're gone."

Ron gave her another look. "If Mrs. Dursley was angry at you for trying to make toast in her kitchen, how do you think she'll take some bloody wards?"

"Keep your voice down, Ron!" Hermione hissed.

"And anyway, I can't," Harry said. "I'm not of age yet."

"We are," Hermione said happily. "And the Ministry can't tell which one of us it is that's using magic, can they? So if they send an Owl after you, that's settled."

"Statute of Secrecy?"

"The Dursleys already know, sort of," Hermione said. "And we can make sure the others don't see."

"Hermione," Harry said, "Do you really think anything we do could keep Voldemort out if he really wanted to get into Privet Drive? I mean, if he can break into the Department of Mysteries, what chance do we stand?"

Hermione stuck her chin out in a very Hermione fashion. "It isn't right not to do something. We could give them a little time, maybe. We could give them that."

Ron sighed, but he put his arm over her shoulders. "You're a better woman than I am, Hermione."

Harry just sighed.

"You want to do what?" Petunia Dursley said, one hand on her hip, the other holding a sponge she'd been recently using to clean the frying pan she'd used to cook that morning's bacon.

"Put up some wards," Hermione said again. "Protective magic. Safeguards. A bit like a magic security system, if you know what I mean."

"We already have a security system," Aunt Petunia said, looking suspicious.

"This will work better in case of strange wizards," Hermione said. "And – well, I don't know how much Harry's told you – but things are getting worse in our world – in the Wizarding world, I mean. There's sort of a war on, and, well, we thought it might be a good idea just to put up something in case for whatever reason this war should somehow affect you and your family."

Hermione's brown eyes shone with earnestness, and she twisted the front of her sundress awkwardly as she spoke, trying very hard to meet Petunia's gimlet eyes.

Petunia looked very ill, and she suddenly turned toward Harry, her eyes hard. "Whatever happened to your Professor Dumbledore? I thought he already – " But she stopped, her speech arrested as if paralyzed by fright at her own train of thought.

"Professor Dumbledore is dead," Harry said flatly. "That's why you might be in danger. The war is going to be worse now."

Petunia groped for the kitchen counter, her feet sliding out from beneath her, and Hermione dashed to fetch her a chair. "Are you all right, Mrs. Dursley?" she asked solicitously, exchanged a puzzled glance with Ron and Harry.

"He can't be," Petunia said, shaking her head violently. "He –" The horse-faced woman made a violent movement with one hand, as if trying to dispell some terrible vision.

"Well, he is," Harry said flatly again, not particularly full of sympathy for his aunt. She'd hardly treated him with any courtesy when they'd met a year before, and he found it hard to believe that wizard-hating Aunt Petunia could feel any grief for the man.

"Go," Petunia said, her voice hoarse. "There's a box, under the third stair, the loose floorboard – bring it to me."

Ron's brow furrowed in confusion, but he dashed off, and some seconds later, panting a little returned it. "Here you go," he said to Petunia, dropping it into her lap.

Hands shaking, the woman unlocked the catch and opened the lid of the box. Inside was a small pile of letters – letters written with quill pens on wizarding parchment, Harry saw to his complete and utter surprise. They were faded and yellowed, some of them obviously very old, and as Petunia leafed through them, something dawned on Harry.

"The letter! The letter Professor Dumbledore left with me as a baby – you have it? You _kept_ it? And you didn't show it to me?" He was indignant, and any curiosity he might have had about his aunt's distress evaporated.

"The letter was addressed to me," Petunia snapped, "And there wasn't any point after that – that _giant_ of a man – came to fetch you, he told you everything that mattered, I'm sure. And parts of that letter were _private_. I never even told your uncle."

Again, Harry, Ron, and Hermione exchanged glances. What on earth was going on, Harry wondered – and what were the _other_ letters in that box?

Petunia was scanning a page of yellowed parchment intensely. "That Dumbledore man thought the same thing – protection, or whatever you call it… when he left _you_ with us, boy, he did something to keep you safe, oh yes, that was his first concern, but he promised me that while you were in the house with us, we'd all be safe from this Lord Voldemort person… _Lord_…"

Ron visibly flinched at the name, and Harry stared at her. "You mean that while I'm in the house, you're safe, too?" he said incredulously. "And you never bloody well bothered to mention it?"

"Oh, but it makes perfect sense, Harry!" Hermione exclaimed. "Of course! While you're here with your mother's blood protecting you, so to speak, V- Voldemort can't touch you – he physically can't come here, and neither can the Death Eaters – I guess because of the Mark, maybe – and so when you're here, the Death Eaters or whatever can't touch the Dursleys, either!"

Inside, Harry groaned. If he wanted to keep the Dursleys safe for as long as possible, he'd have to stay in their house until the end of _July_ – and he couldn't do that. There was too much for him to do, and he couldn't wait. Not any longer. Not now that people were dying.

"Well, that's going to run out anyway," he said roughly. "When I turn seventeen. And I can't stay here all summer, there's stuff – I need to take care of. So we'll have to do something else."

Petunia flared up. "Sixteen years!" she hissed. "Sixteen years, we've been giving you room and board, spending money on you, hiding you from the blasted neighbors, sixteen years we've been letting you leech off of us, and now you're ready to – to put my son at danger! And you do think he's in danger, we're in danger, or else you wouldn't be bothering with any of this, would you?"

Harry wondered, momentarily, that he'd ever thought Petunia Dursley as stupid as her husband and son. "Yeah, sixteen years of you treating me like the dirt under Dudley's feet!" he shot back. "Was I so hard to ignore, even when you kept me in a bloody closet for three weeks at a time? How about when you put bars on my window and door, and fed me through a fucking cat flap? Was I so much of a trouble then?"

"I didn't want you!" Petunia bawled back, her knuckles white on the arms of her chair. "You, looking at me just like my dratted sister, you, unnatural from the day you were born, you, terrifying my _real_ son – but I took you, oh, I took you! I fed you and I sent you to school, didn't I? I never hit you, you weren't _abused_!"

Harry's face was white with anger, and he turned away slightly, not looking at her. "Do you ever wonder," he said tightly, "what my mother, your _dratted_ sister, would have done if you'd died, and she'd been left to raise Dudley?"

Petunia made no reply, and instead began crying angrily and silently.

"Um," Ron said, looking a little unnerved, "This doesn't really settle the issue of, er, wards and things."

Savagely, Harry turned back to face Petunia. "I'll do the best that I can," he grated. "I'll even set them up so that they warn me if you're in danger." He paused, and looked at Hermione. "You can do that, right?" he asked?

Hermione opened her mouth, no doubt to give an explanation of the arithmantic theory behind it, but Ron butted in, "Yeah, mate. My Dad's set it up so that if something goes wrong at the Burrow and he and Mum aren't home, it'll let them know. He's got it so that the Aurors will know right away, too. Kingsley helped set it up for him."

"There," Harry said. "And so long as it's before July 31, if I'm even in this bloody house you'll be safe. I can Apparate all right now, so that's not a problem."

Petunia looked by turns ill and furious, but finally she said, "All right. But not now. Wait until I can get Vernon and Dudley out of the house. Lord knows, it shouldn't be hard – neither of them want to endure another dinner with _you_."

Harry stared at her implacably. Petunia stood.

"Oh," she said, almost as an afterthought. "Some of these letters were from your mother. You can have them, if you'd like." Carelessly, she grabbed a fistful of papers, shoving them toward Harry, before stalking out of her kitchen.

Harry clutched at the yellowing bits of parchment desperately, trying not to tear the fragile bits of paper.

Ron, meanwhile, had sunken with a heavy sigh into Petunia's vacated chair. "Well," he said ominously. "What exactly are we going to do about those wards, then?"


	3. Chapter Two

**Chapter Two: Faction and Intrigue**

9:27 p.m, June 5, 1997

Draco Malfoy stood awkwardly outside the library door. Inside, his mother was crying. She had fainted when her father had returned home late on the evening of the first of June, though perhaps because he had brought with him nearly the entirety of the Death Eaters. At the moment, a good thirty still resided in his father's house, now turned fortress for the Dark Lord, including Fenrir Greyback – who made a habit of leering at him whenever they passed in the hallways. Draco did not like this, but he did not know how to do anything but tolerate it. And his father was back, now; that was something. Lucius Malfoy still radiated power, and Draco still had faith in his father's ability to make things right.

His mother's sobs rather eroded that faith, however. Draco didn't know how they'd happened to have a falling-out, but he suspected that it had somehow or another been about him. They had been tense after the first tearful reunion, when Lucius had learned of whatever pact it was Narcissa Malfoy had made with Severus Snape. Draco had managed to overhear just enough of their conversation to glean that piece of information, which did make sense of the Potions Master's behavior that year. Part of Draco wanted to be stung by her lack of faith in him, but the wiser, if smaller, part of Draco knew that he could thank his mother for the fact that he was still alive.

Finally willing himself to do something, Draco knocked twice on the doorframe before walking into the library. "Mother," he said awkwardly, as gently as he could.

Narcissa raised her head from the arm of the sofa, whisps of hair fallen from her elaborate knot curling about her tear-stained face. "You're leaving?" she whispered. "Of course, of course you are – the rest of them have their cloaks on, of course. You're to be summoned." Her voice was bitter.

"Yes," Draco replied, still feeling awkward. "The summonses should come any moment now. I just wanted to say goodbye before I left."

"Do you know what you're being summoned for? Your father won't tell me." The bitterness in her voice was stronger than ever.

Draco hesitated, unsure whether he should speak. But his mother's glittering eyes, that eerily piercing grey of the Black family, seemed to compel him. Feeling weak, and angry at that feeling, Draco muttered, "Just to discuss the Azkaban breakout, I suppose. And Dumbledore's death. It's the first full meeting of the Death Eaters since before last year."

"And I'm to be alone in the house again," Narcissa replied.

Draco said nothing.

"Go, go," Narcissa said, her voice breaking. "Get out!"

Draco left.

The Malfoy Manor was a stately house, with little of the original medieval architecture intact. It had been built almost anew in the late seventeenth century after devastating fires, and its long, airy galleries were in clear imitation of French palaces at the time. The house, and its various courtyards, chapels, and carriage houses, extended over eleven square miles of unplottable, Muggle-repelling grounds, the remnants of what had once been an even larger estate when the Malfoys had ruled as feudal lords over much of Wiltshire, holding great influence both in the Muggle and Wizarding world. Shortly after the original Malfoy Manor was destroyed by fire, however, the International Statute of Secrecy put an end to what remained of the Malfoys' feudal pretensions, and by the late eighteenth century, the Malfoy grounds had shrunken, and the villages once within its dominions were emptied, the people gone to seek work in factories and mills.

A heavy mist clung to the grounds that evening, lending everything a silver, vaguely sinister glow; the candles in their brackets did little to dispel the darkness. Draco shivered, and drew his cloak closer to him. It was the thick and silent black of a Death Eater, and it had been his for nearly a year. His mask formed a reassuring weight in his pockets. Soon. Soon.

When the call came, it was sudden and painful; Draco was still not used to it, and wondered whether he ever would be. Wasting no time, he Apparated.

He was one of the first to arrive; his father was there shortly before him, but the rest of those staying at the Malfoy Manor took somewhat longer. Long ago a suspicious ancestor had spelled the house to allow the Apparition and Disapparition only of the Master of the House, and of his family: a precaution that had served Lucius Malfoy well over the years. Falling into step behind his father, Draco set out for the entrance into the Dark Lord's fortress.

The air was somewhat colder in Wales, Draco thought as he affixed his mask to his face. Perhaps it was simply the elevation; the Skirrid Fawr, onto which summit they had Apparated, loomed three thousand feet above the city below. Draco did not know the path well, certainly not by night, and was glad of his father before him to show the way.

The entrance to the Dark Lord's fortress lay inside a ruined chapel to St. Michael, a little way down from the summit; hidden behind layer upon layer of enchantment was the mouth of a tunnel, a tunnel which led into the center of the mountain, sloping down into the damp, dank limestone.

As Lucius did not light his wand upon entering the tunnel, neither did Draco. The boy found what comfort he could in the sound of his father's footfalls in front of him.

The Dark Lord held his court in a great, natural cavern, wide enough and wider to hold the full circle of the Death Eaters' assembled ranks; the Dark Lord himself sat enthroned upon a great, serpent-carved chair upon a high stone dais. Behind his dais stood the doorways into the fourth circle. Draco had never yet been permitted to enter that far into the Skirrid Fawr, being still too junior; he reflected that that might change this night, were the Dark Lord to acknowledge his service. As he was not yet dead for his partial failure, Draco concluded that the Dark Lord was in the mood to reward his successes rather than punish his shortcomings.

The circle filled quickly, some hurrying forward first to do their obeisance at the foot of the dais, others simply moving to their place in the circle. Bellatrix Lestrange was obvious on her entrance, both as one of only two female Death Eaters, and for her prolonged bow, before taking her place at the direct right of the dais. Draco watched, feeling tension mount in his body. Something was about to change.

The Dark Lord stood suddenly from the richly-engraved wooden chair which served as his throne, and strode to the edge of the dais, surveying his Death Eaters for a long moment.

"Death Eaters," he began. "You stand complete for the first time in nearly sixteen years. Your Master has returned. Your compatriots have been freed from Azkaban. And Albus Dumbledore is dead at the hands of one of your fellows." He paused again, his red eyes clearly visible in the dim light of the throne room. He sniffed he air, as if he, like a snake, could smell fear or uncertainty.

"The Dark Lord shall soon usher in a new era of Wizarding History. Change is at hand, and the Dark Lord's Death Eaters are the instrument of that change. Yet they too must change to face this new world. They too must alter their very structure as the Dark rises." His voice was not loud, but it carried, perhaps due to the silence of all others present; it echoed in the large stone room, his sibilants lingering the longest.

"New heroes must be recognized alongside the fallen martyrs. They are living embodiments of the Dark Lord's cause, and of true service. They are those servants who went to Azkaban rather than betray their Lord. And they are Severus Snape, at whose hand Albus Dumbledore at last fell. Step forward, Severus Snape, and receive the Dark Lord's honor."

From the left of the dais, a tall, gaunt figure approached the dais, throwing himself into a deep bow before rising and slowly climbing at a signal from his Master. Slowly, and very gravely, the Dark Lord inclined his head to Severus Snape.

Shock surged silently and palpably through the assembled ranks. Draco knew he couldn't remember the Dark Lord giving any such honor in the past, but even those who had served for decades – his father, for one; his Aunt Bellatrix, for another – held themselves with such rigid self-control that Draco knew they could not believe what they had seen.

This, then, Draco concluded, was unprecedented.

Severus Snape bowed very low again to his Master, but now despite the depths to which he stooped, it seemed respect given to an equal, and not to a lord.

Draco shivered. The balance of power had changed.

"The time has come to name new leaders to the cause, to replace old blood with new," the Dark Lord said, his voice now carrying the bark of command. "At this moment, all Death Eaters are equal in the eyes of the Dark Lord. All ranks are abolished, and new ones shall be created shortly."

Again, the crowds stirred uneasily, and Draco felt a knife prick at his heart. His father – his father, Lucius – had been one of three lieutenants nearly from the year he had entered service as a Death Eater…

Draco surveyed the other masked and cloaked figures. He was sharply aware of how junior he was: only two Death Eaters had been initiated since the Dark Lord's return to power, and he did not know who they were, simply that they existed; yet they had joined before he had been forced to take the Mark, and they were certainly not teenaged boys. He was the youngest by decades, the weakest, and the least in the Dark Lord's service. He had done his part to serve his Master, yes, and had helped in the killing of Albus Dumbledore, but he had not been honored by the Dark Lord for his part, and somehow he did not think that this new equality would advance him very far.

"First," Lord Voldemort said, turning his eyes toward the far left in the circle, "I name Antonin Dolohov, eldest of the Dark Lord's servants. Antonin Dolohov, you are to attend the Dark Lord as one of his trusted lieutenants." This was no great change: Dolohov had been such a leader since the late 1960s.

"Under this lieutenant's command I place Rookwood, to aid him in his service," Lord Voldemort said, and now there was a change: previously that position had belonged to Severus Snape. "And under these servants I place Yaxley, Mulciber, the Averies, and Pettigrew."

"Second," Lord Voldemort said, turning toward the middle, "I name Lucius Malfoy, recently freed from Azkaban Prison. Lucius Malfoy, you are to attend the Dark Lord as one of his trusted lieutenants. Under this lieutenant's command I place Nott, to aid him in his service." No change here. "And under these servants I place the Carrows, Jugson, Goyle, Crabbe, and Draco Malfoy, youngest of the Dark Lord's servants."

Draco winced, though the expression was hidden under his mask.

"Third," Lord Voldemort said, his eyes straying toward Bellatrix Lestrange momentarily before moving to focus on Severus Snape, still a step below him, "I name Severus Snape, triumphant among the Dark Lord's servants. Severus Snape, you are to attend the Dark Lord as one of his trusted lieutenants." Lord Voldemort did not pause despite the momentousness of this announcement. Bellatrix Lestrange had served as a lieutenant since before the Dark Lord's fall.

"Under this lieutenant's command I place Bellatrix Lestrange, to aid him in his service. And under these servants I place the brothers Lestrange, Travers, Macnair, Greyback…" This last faction, Draco noticed, was by far the largest, as the Dark Lord continued to name servants, many of whom he had not known bore the Dark Lord's mark. He supposed it was because Bellatrix Lestrange's command had historically been concerned mostly with battles and drill, and the training of new recruits – certainly, his aunt had taken him in hand when first he became a Death Eater.

Bellatrix Lestrange stood quivering and rigid, and Draco was not the only Death Eater to stare at her. The Dark Lord's favor toward her was renowned – that she had been stripped of her status as a lieutenant, that she had been placed under _Severus Snape_… when everyone knew she loathed the man… Draco shuddered. They were both currently resident in his father's house, and he feared to imagine any meeting between them.

Once the factions were reassigned, the Dark Lord issued further commands, but Draco could not keep his mind on them. He was vaguely aware that these new orders concerned him – certainly, he would be a part of the raids and battles described – but his mind was on the shifts in power. He'd never known what to make of his former professor. Certainly, the man was a genius. He'd shown considerable favor to Draco over the years – though, given the friendship between his father and the professor, that had hardly been unexpected. Yet his insistence in interfering in Draco's plans the previous year had angered Draco at the time, and even now it annoyed him. Grudgingly Draco could admit to himself that if Snape hadn't come along just then, he would have failed – but it rubbed him raw to see Snape get all the acknowledgment, and him none.

And by the looks of it, his Aunt Bellatrix was fuming, too. For whatever reason she'd been excluded from the raid on Hogwarts, and that, Draco thought, couldn't sit well with her. An angry Bellatrix Lestrange, he'd learned to his cost, was a dangerous thing, but she'd coached him in occlumency and in the Unforgivables, and he thought she loved him. Things would be very taught at home after this meeting, Draco reflected. Very taught indeed.


	4. Chapter Three

**Chapter Three: Tabbies and Stags**

3:00 p.m., June 8, 1997

Harry woke with a shout of pain, clutching at his forehead. He'd risen so suddenly from where he'd been resting, on one of the little benches in the back lawn, that he knocked his glasses off of his chest, and fell on them as he rolled off of the bench. Swearing, he inspected the damage. The lenses themselves were fine….

"Harry, mate," Ron Weasley said, jogging over and looking concerned. "What's wrong? Your scar again, is it?"

"Yes," Harry said, wincing. His forehead still throbbed uncomfortably. "I had a dream. The first one since – since Sirius…"

He struggled to recall what he'd seen. He'd seen through Voldemort's eyes again, felt through those long white hands…

He was dragged out of his brief reverie by Hermione's shrill and fearful voice. "Harry? Harry, are you okay? Ron said that you'd had another one of your _dreams_, and that your scar is hurting again. Can I get you anything? Do you need an aspirin?"

"Hermione, shut up and let me think!" Harry snarled, and Hermione subsided, looking hurt. On the edges of his vision, Harry saw Ron put his arm around the girl.

"I was – I was _him_ again. Looking through his eyes. And it was night, very late at night."

"You were outside?" Ron said excitedly. "Could you see where?"

"No, inside, in some building or something. Only I know it was night because Voldemort said … something about how that evening's meeting shouldn't make her think she was out of favor…"

"Her?" Hermione interrupted again. Harry glared at his friend, and then continued.

"Bellatrix Lestrange. He was talking to Bellatrix about… something. About Snape, it was about Snape!" Harry exclaimed, the full scene coming back to him. "There had just been a huge meeting – all of the Death Eaters – and he was talking to Bellatrix Lestrange because… because he'd done something to make her think she was out of favor. Only he was telling her that it was just a ploy, and that he only wanted people to think that he supported Severus Snape. And that she should spy on him, since they were all living together…"

"Did he say where?" Ron interjected again.

"No, no, that's when I woke up," Harry said, annoyed. "It was weird. Usually when I've woken up before it was because he was thinking of me, he was angry at me, but this time I just – woke. Like the vision ended, and then I woke."

Hermione frowned, puzzled. "And have'nt all your dreams always been in – well, in the present? When you were looking into V- Voldemort's mind? And it's afternoon, now."

"He could be in China or Timbuktu or something," Ron suggested.

"I don't think so," Harry said, shaking his head. "It looked like – like England."

"How do you know?" Hermione asked, quizzically. "You said you didn't know where he was."

"Well, the building, the room wherever he was, it just looked English, I guess. The rugs and things." Harry shrugged. He hadn't really been paying attention to the furniture, but it hadn't felt foreign.

"Okay," Hermione said, still looking doubtful. "But this is weird. This seems different from all the other times, doesn't it, Harry? I think you should talk to –" But she paused, and said no more. In the past, Hermione always would have named Professor Dumbledore.

"There's no-one to talk to about this," Harry said, shrugging. "Except you two, and unless you have any brainwaves about what it means…"

"Well, this is really important, Harry!" Hermione said excitedly. "You-know-who –"

Harry raised an eyebrow.

"Oh, all right, Voldemort, he doesn't trust Snape!"

"Who would?" Ron said bitterly. "He's betrayed everybody else, who's he got left to stab in the back."

Hermione opened her mouth, obviously about to contradict Ron as was usual, and then paused. "You know, I think you've got a point, Ron," she said thoughtfully. "I mean, Snape said he was spying on the Death Eaters for the Order, didn't he, when really he was spying on the Order for the Death Eaters, but when it comes down to it, he's a sort of double agent or spy or whatever no matter who he's working for, and I'd be a bit paranoid, too, wouldn't you, Harry? I mean, Voldemort must know he's an Occlumens, and how can he know if Snape's telling the truth?"

Harry shrugged, bad-temperedly. "Well, we all knew he wasn't _stupid_. Voldemort, I mean. Of course he suspects Snape of double-crossing him, Snape's a traitor as bad as Pettigrew, and Voldemort doesn't trust him, either, does he? I remember, he didn't trust Pettigrew to go to Hogwarts in our fourth year because… what was it, he wanted a servant whose loyalty had never wavered, and Pettigrew's not exactly been faithful to anyone, has he? Same with Snape."

"Well, we have to tell this to somebody," Hermione said, still excited at this new riddle. "I mean, it could be really _useful_ information for the Order."

"I guess so," Harry said.

And then, because it was hot, and they had to pack their bags again as they were leaving for the Burrow that evening, they went inside, Harry first, Ron and Hermione behind, holding hands as if it were the most natural thing in the world for them to do.

Harry was trying to force his suitcase to close properly by sitting on it when they saw the Patronus. Like a rush of water it bounded through the walls, ethereal as a ghost. Harry, Ron, and Hermione gaped at it, but only for a second: because upon entering the room, the Patronus – a small-boned cat with silvery tabby markings – ran straight toward Harry and leapt _inside_ of him.

It felt as queer as being sat on by a ghost, and not nearly so pleasant; Harry felt a rush of cold run from his toes and fingertips upward, moving toward the center of his body and then into his head. And just as he thought he might die of cold, he heard a voice, distinct and sharp, inside his head.

"_Potter_," the voice said. "You are to report to Number 12, Grimmauld Place at 9:30 P.M. this evening, for the Order of the Phoenix meets again, and it requires your presence. Do _not_ be late."

And then the voice was gone, and Harry fell back, his ears ringing.

"What was _that_?" Hermione exclaimed, staring at Harry with huge, shocked eyes. Ron looked equally nonplussed.

"It was a Patronus," Harry said unsteadily.

"Yes, of course," Hermione said impatiently, "but – it leapt _inside_ of you. Patronuses don't do that, do they?"

"It was McGonagall's," Harry said slowly, still blinking to get the world to come back into focus.

"How do you know?" Ron replied, looking confused.

"Well, for one, it was a tabby cat," Harry said drily. "But for another, the thing spoke to me. As in, I had Professor McGonagall speaking to me in my head."

Ron and Hermione exchanged puzzled looks, so Harry said exasperatedly, "It was a message, okay? It, uh, said that there was going to be an Order meeting tonight at 9:30 and that I should be there. Uh."

"I've never heard of Patronuses being used like this before," Hermione said, her eyes shining as she stored away this bit of knowledge. "As messengers."

Harry paused, a flash of memory coming back to him. "I think I have, yeah," he said. "I saw Dumbledore do it once. And Tonks, when I thought her Patronus had changed to Padfoot, when really all along it was Professor Lupin. I didn't know they carried messages, though, I thought they just sort of… signaled, or something."

"What do you think McGonagall wants you for?" Ron asked, a little perplexed. "I mean, you're not in the Order."

"No, I'm not," Harry said. It seemed odd, that he, who would have to face Voldemort in the end, wasn't even a part of the society dedicated to defeating him. "Not right now, anyway."

"Didn't – didn't you inherit the house from Sirius, Harry?" Hermione asked quietly.

"Yeah," Harry said, shoving his hands in his pockets.

"Well, it probably has something to do with that. I mean, it is _your_ house, after all, and now that Professor Dumbledore's gone… well… things are going to change, I suppose."

"Yeah," Harry said, not able to articulate anything more complex. There was a long silence.

"Well, I guess we'd better get going," Ron said. "To Grimmauld Place."

"Why?" Harry replied. "Message said for 9:30, and it's hardly 4:00."

"Well, yes," Hermione said, "But there's a marvelous library there, and –"

"You're thinking of reading _books_, after everything that's happened, that's going to happen today?" Harry said incredulously.

"Not reading for _fun_, Harry," Hermione said irritably. "For research. I'm still looking for RAB, after all."

"You're not going to find him in a book," Harry said. It was a gut feeling. Whoever this wizard was – he thought it was a wizard; it _felt_ like a wizard – he didn't seem like the type to end up in newspaper clippings, somehow.

"I found Eileen Prince," Hermione objected.

Seeing the stubborn look in her face, and the helplessly shrugged shoulders of his best friend, Harry sighed. "Oh, all right then. It's not as if I really _wanted_ to hang around Privet Drive any longer."

So in a bustle of bags and trunks, and a hasty goodbye on Harry's part to his Aunt and Uncle – Dudley was still hiding – they departed. Harry felt an uncomfortable prickle as he left his relations' house. It was weird. He should have been happy, since as far as he knew he was leaving the Dursleys for good, but something still felt wrong about it.

They'd shrunk everything down so that it would just look like normal luggage to anyone watching, but Harry didn't like hanging about. "Apparate?" he said in a low voice to Ron and Hermione. "Or –"

"Knight Bus," Hermione suggested promptly.

"We can't take the Knight Bus to _Headquarters_!" Ron hissed. "Moody would kill us!"

"Not to Grimmauld Place, Ron," Hermione said with an air of put-upon patience. "To the Leaky Cauldron, and we can Apparate from there. There's so much magic there, they'll never be able to notice that you two are Apparating without licenses, or that Harry's still under-aged."

This was good sense.

It was so odd, Harry thought, how the Muggle neighbors didn't even notice the huge triple-decker bus in front of them, but would spend hours nit-picking over the height of the grass in their lawns.

Riding the bus without Stan Shunpike felt wrong to Harry, and Ernie Prang, the driver, looked visibly depressed. The new conductor, a smart witch with long blonde braids, was cheerful and efficient, but somehow couldn't hold a candle.

"Stan still locked up, then, Ernie?" Harry said uncomfortably, hands shoved in his pockets.

"Yeah," the driver said tersely. "Hang on a minute, you're Harry Potter again, ain't you?" He glanced at Harry with a mixture of puzzlement and suspicion, and for some odd reason, Harry felt a strong urge to flatten his bangs over his scar.

"Er, yes," Harry said.

"Well, why don't you do something about all this?" Ernie said, gesturing expansively while the Knight Bus – now apparently in Kent – drove through several bushes and a mailbox. "This war, and Stan, and all that. They're all saying you're the Chosen One, aren't they? So why aren't you doing anything about it?"

Harry felt his temper rising. It didn't help that he was on his way to do "something", but couldn't exactly _tell_ the driver. "Maybe I _am_ doing something about it," Harry snarled, "But I'm not about to tell the whole bus about it."

Harry noticed that the whole bus had gone rather quiet.

Suddenly, Hermione was at his arm, dragging him away from Ernie and up several flights of stairs, until he was on the very top of the bus.

"Are you crazy?" Hermione hissed at him. "Shouting about all that, in front of all those people? We're not supposed to be _advertising_ our whereabouts, Harry!"

"Oh, let off, why don't you!" Harry shouted back. She was right, and he knew it, but why did she always have to be so – so – "You're not my mother, Hermione, so you can very well stop acting like it!"

Ron, meanwhile, seemed to be intent on playing the peacemaker. "Er, guys, you're still shouting," he said helpfully. "Could we maybe save this for later?"

The three of them staggered off of the bus some thirty minutes later along with an elderly warlock and a young woman dragging several screaming toddlers. They made their way through The Leaky Cauldron, and out into Diagon Alley, looking for somewhere they could Apparate from without being strictly noticed.

Diagon Alley had changed even more from last summer, Harry noticed bleakly. Not only were there signs and posters on self defense everywhere, but the cosmopolitan feel was entirely lost – there were _Aurors_ stationed throughout the Alley, Harry noticed, bright badges on their chests; the street hawkers who had been so omnipresent before were now gone entirely. The place felt like a prison, not England's center of Wizarding commerce and culture.

"Fred and George's," Ron said, and they all nodded, hurrying after him.

Suddenly Hermione stopped, looking at one of the Aurors.

"Tonks!" she exclaimed happily. "Your hair!"

Harry turned around, a little impatient, but looking at Tonks's happy face, he couldn't help but smile a little, too. She was back to a purple as vibrant as the Ministry Safety Signs.

"You like it?" Tonks said. "I know it seems a little too, um, festive, given the circumstances, but –" She cut herself off. "Hang on, what are you three _doing_ here?"

"Going to Fred and George's," Ron said promptly.

"We needed a place to Apparate from," Hermione explained. "Harry being underage and all."

"Er, kids, I am on duty right now," Tonks said helpfully. "As in, I'm an Auror. Thus, you shouldn't be telling me about the laws you're planning to break thirty seconds from now."

"It's for the you-know-what at nine-thirty," Hermione said helpfully.

"Getting there a bit early," Tonks said frowning. "But go on, then, I suppose. None of my business. And I can't stand here talking with you all day – I'm on duty, after all."

They noticed her glance nervously at one of the other Aurors along the street, and, with a quick farewell, set off again.

"I am glad," Hermione said, looking rather more cheerful. "I always liked Professor Lupin."

"I didn't know you knew Tonks that well," Harry said, a little curious.

"Well, not very well," Hermione said. "But she's always been nice to Ginny and me, and I think Ginny really looks up to her, as a sort of role-model. I mean, how may female Aurors _are_ there?"

"I think Tonks is the only one," Ron said. "It was in the news, actually, I think."

"What?" Hermione said, clearly surprised.

"Yeah, she's the first since Alice Longbottom or something. It was in the Prophet when she finished her training in 1994. I think Mum clipped it for Ginny or something, Ginny really wanted to be an Auror when she was thirteen."

Harry was quietly astonished. He'd never thought of _Ginny_ as an Auror before. Him and Ron, sure, and even maybe Hermione, but Ginny? He'd always thought of her as the sort of person that the he – and the Aurors – were supposed to protect.

Fred and George weren't at the register when they walked into the shop, but Verity, their assistant, came up to greet them promptly. "Are Fred and George here?" Ron asked her. "I'm their brother," Ron said helpfully.

"I'd noticed," Verity said with a little laugh. "They're in their office, shall I go tell them you're here?"

Fred and George were happy, if puzzled, to see them.

"What can we do for you?" Fred said cheerfully.

"It's summer holidays, so you can't be needing a snackbox," George said thoughtfully.

"And I don't suppose you're here for our Daydream Charms," Fred replied, "You being serious war-hero sorts of people."

"That's true," George added on. "So I suppose you might be interested in our practical inventions? Shield Cloaks?"

"Shield Gloves? Shield Boots?"

"Decoy Detonators?"

"Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder?"

"Speaking of which!" Ron said angrily. "I've been meaning to talk to you about that stuff – you need to watch who gets their hands on that stuff!"

"We have," Fred said indignantly.

"We haven't sold it to any Death Eaters, we'd have noticed!" George added.

"I mean, it's not as if Lucius Malfoy could just walk in."

"What about Draco Malfoy?" Hermione said suspiciously.

"Yeah, but we didn't know about him before. We just figured him for a regular git," Fred said defensively.

"Well, he's _used_ it, in _combat_," Harry said severely.

Fred's face looked very ugly for a moment, but he calmed down, and smiled brightly. "Well, we'll just be more careful then, right George?"

"Right, Fred," his twin replied.

"So what can we do for you?"

"We just wanted a place to apparate from, actually," Hermione said a little sheepishly. "Since Harry's underaged. We need to get to Headquarters, you know."

"Ohh," George said. "So McGonagall sent you the notice, too?"

"Yeah," Harry said.

"Jolly good, then," Fred said, clapping his hands together. "Just do it in here, I suppose."

"Thanks," Harry said a little awkwardly. "See you tonight."

And they Apparated.

There was dust thick on the floor again, Harry noticed, thick enough to muffle their footsteps and leave tracks on the stairs. Kreacher's absence had had some effect – or maybe it was more Molly Weasley's – but headquarters was grimmer than it had been before even the place had been decontaminated.

The air was thick with ghosts.

They all shivered a little, and Harry, feeling awkward as it was _his_ house, and then again it wasn't, said, "I suppose we should go park our bags. Same rooms as last time, I guess."

With that done, they trekked down into the long drawing room, with its tall bookshelves. Many of the darkest books Sirius had tried to throw away, but someone had persuaded him to keep the majority, even those of an unsavory character, and the shelves, dusty as everything else in the house, were still bent by the weight of centuries of knowledge.

Hermione gave a little wriggle Harry could only identify as delight, and began to pore over the shelves with total concentration. He and Ron looked at each other, and shrugged.

Harry briefly tried to help, but not knowing quite what Hermione was looking for, and after being snapped at for "getting in her way", he gave up, and wandered over to the tapestry, tracing its lines with his fingers. There were many men named Sirius on the tree, Harry noticed. It had been a family name. And there were little pockmarks here and there, marking some child who'd failed to live up to the family's standards…

It gave Harry the creeps, and, not quite excusing himself, he left the drawing room and went upstairs, to where he and Ron had parked themselves. He flung himself down on the bed, exhausted. A clock on a rickety bedside table read 6:54. Hermione only had a little while longer to look before McGonagall, and all the rest, started to arrive.

"Oh, it's you again," came a tired, drawling voice from out of nowhere. Harry started, but then recognized the archly arrogant tones as those of Phineas Nigellus.

The portrait had somehow remained free of dust, and the old headmaster glared down at Harry as disdainfully as ever. "I'd heard," the portrait began, "that you'd inherited my family's ancient home. And not even a drop of Black blood in you for six generations."

"What?" Harry said, curiously. "You mean, I'm related to Sirius?"

"Well, _distantly_," Phineas said, with a wave of his hand. "If you look far enough in the Potter family tree, there's sure to be a Black or two. I taught your great-grandmother, you know. Went to school with others among your ancestors and ancestresses. A family with an _unfortunate_ predilection toward Gryffindor."

Harry's heart swelled with pride a little. "What were they like?" he said, more eagerly than he'd wished.

"Your family? Arrogant and pig-headed, though in a different way from we Blacks, of course. Constantly concerned with justice, and terrified of anything other than lily-white magic."

Harry grinned. "So I'm part of a tradition, then," he said.

"Oh, yes, I suppose," Phineas said, trying his best to sound bored. "If that's what you want to call generational intractability."

They grew quiet for a little while. Phineas did not leave, as Harry had expected him to.

"What?" Harry said after a little while, distinctly uncomfortable at being stared at. "Don't you have somewhere else to be?"

"Hogwarts is almost as quiet as this tomb," Phineas replied. "The paint isn't even yet dry on my late colleague's new portrait, and as McGonagall hasn't yet been appointed formally by the Board of Governors, there's been no news for weeks."

"Dumbledore has a portrait?" Harry said, dumbfounded.

"Well of course he does, idiot," Phineas replied airily. "Is he – or rather, was he – not a Headmaster of Hogwarts? His dry wisdom must be preserved, to be regurgitated for the generations yet to come."

Harry's temper flared a little at the insult, but there were more pressing matters. "And he's like you?" Harry said eagerly. "He can talk, and think, and move about?"

Phineas paused. "We portraits are not ghosts, you know," he replied slowly. "We are – only as good as the rendering. My painter was, it's true, especially good, but… he had an eye for charicature."

Harry digested this slowly. "But Dumbledore – he's still Dumbledore, isn't he?"

"I do not yet know," Phineas said. "He'd commissioned the portrait a few weeks before… well. But the painter hadn't quite finished, and had to do the rest from memory, we portraits watched him do it. And the paint is not yet dry."

It was all too much for Harry to digest. But the idea of seeing, and talking, to Dumbledore again – even if only through a portrait – was too wonderful…

"Why didn't Sirius do it?" Harry said in anguish. "Could we do it, now? Have him painted?"

Phineas shook his head sharply. "The painting must be done while the subject is alive. It catches a little of the person's soul, you know, if the paints are stirred correctly. Perserves, more like. Preserves the spirit."

"What?" Harry exclaimed. "The – soul? But isn't that Dark magic?"

"No, of course not," Phineas snapped. "It's a natural thing, and entirely light. It is a leaving-behind voluntarily – oh, you wouldn't understand, you are young."

With a roar of frustration, Harry threw himself back onto the bed, shoving his head into one of the pillows.

There was silence again.

"This used to be your godfather's room, you know," Phineas said after a while. "Yes," he said, seeing Harry look up. "Until he was sixteen, when he ran away."

Harry stared. "You mean, he slept here and – everything?"

"Isn't that what I just said? And then Regulus moved into it, when Sirius left. My grand-daughter Walburga was in such a temper when he left, she tried to destroy everything of his, you know, even his memory. She tried to pretend that Regulus had always been an only child, had always been the first-born."

Harry lay back, stunned. How many times had Sirius talked to his great-grandfather's portrait like this? Stared at this ceiling, and traced with his eyes the patterns of the ceiling tiles?

"He carved his name somewhere in here, I think," Phineas added. "Sirius. In the far left corner."

Harry scrambled off the bed.

Tucked between end table, bed, and thick drapes over the only, small window, were a number of words carved into the rich dark wood. It was too clean to be knife-work, Harry thought. It had been done with a wand.

Far at the bottom were a pair of initials Harry didn't recognize, but a little above that was carved, in the jagged hand Harry recognized as his godfather's, S. R. Black.

"What was his middle name?" Harry whispered, a little awed.

"Rigel, I think," Phineas replied.

There were a number of initials scratched into the wall – C. D. Black, Harry guessed, would be one of the many men named Cygnus in the family… A. L. Black might be Uncle Alphard…

Then his heart froze.

R. A. Black, carved just above Sirius's own initials, in a hand eerily familiar. It flashed into Harry's mind – it was the same script as that on the note in the false locket…

"Phineas," Harry said, his voice hollow, "What was Regulus's middle name?"

"Arcturus," Phineas replied perfunctorily. "Why, did he carve his name down there, too?"

Harry did not answer. Very stiffly, he walked downstairs.

He had every intention of telling Ron and Hermione right away, but then there was a clatter at the door, and in walked Minerva McGonagall, who stared at him with some surprise before saying, "Well, Potter, as it is very properly your house, I suppose I should not be surprised to see you here."


	5. Chapter Four

**Chapter Four: Return of the Phoenix**

7:33 p.m., June 8, 1997

Harry couldn't decide whether or not to be embarrassed. "We're here to do research," Harry said, burning inside to tell Ron and Hermione what he'd found.

"We, Potter?" McGonagall said sharply. "I did not give you permission to bring anyone else to Headquarters."

"It's my house," Harry said, using Hermione's line from before.

McGonagall pursed her lips, looking very displeased. "And what do you mean, _research_? Research for what?"

Harry wished he hadn't said anything. "Something Professor Dumbledore wanted me to do," he muttered, shoving his hands even further into the pockets of his pants. He thought vaguely that he'd best change into robes before the Order arrived as he strove not to meet Professor McGonagall's eyes.

Her eyes were flashing with annoyance as the Transfiguration teacher said acerbically, "Is this the 'something' you refuse to tell me but about which you have apparently informed all your friends?"

"Er, yes," Harry said awkwardly. "Professor Dumbledore said I might."

McGonagall stared at him balefully, but just at that moment, Alastor Moody stumped through the door.

"Area's secure outside, scared off some of those Muggle teenagers – Potter! Didn't expect to see you here so early." He frowned, adding further deep furrows to his heavily scarred face, his magical eye popping slightly in its socket.

"I had stuff to do around here," Harry said, shrugging.

"He brought Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley along with him," McGonagall said tartly, exchanging threatening glances with the ex-Auror.

"They've been here before," Harry said defensively. "They know all about the Order. And anyway, it's _my_ house, and I invited them." Saying it baldly and emphatically like that made him feel queasy. Whatever the deeds might say, this house was Sirius's, and even more than that, it belonged to the now-extinct House of Black. It was a house for ghosts.

Moody studied Harry impassively for a moment. "You're growing up a bit, aren't you, laddie?" he said, musingly. "What've you been up to this past week?"

"I've been with my Aunt and Uncle, with my friends," Harry said nervously. "I assume you know about the protective magic Du- Professor Dumbledore put up?"

Moody nodded sagely. "Aye, he told me a little of it," he admitted.

"And me," McGonagall chimed in. "I was there, you know, when he left you, when Rubeus Hagrid brought you to that doorway. I never liked it, you know, not then and not now, but if it's kept you safe, well." And she shrugged.

"And now you're here with your friends," Moody summarized. "What are they doing here?"

"He won't say," McGonagall said, her voice tart again. "See if you can't persuade him, Alastor, or at least convince him to tell us all _why_ he won't say anything about why Albus – what he was doing that night – well. It does have to do with that night, doesn't it, Potter?" she asked again, her eyes glittering.

"Yeah, all right?" Harry said, growing annoyed. "But he said I shouldn't tell anyone except Ron and Hermione, and that's because they've always done everything with me since our first year, and he knows – I mean, he knew," and Harry winced, "that I couldn't keep secrets from them. Professor Dumbledore set me a task," Harry continued, riding over what the Transfiguration Professor had been about to say, "and Ron and Hermione are going to help me finish it, and that's why we're here now, doing research."

"Albus Dumbledore did not mean to die," Minerva McGonagall said, trying another tack. "He would have told the Order, I'm sure, what all this was about had he known what was going to happen on the Tower." She closed her eyes, pained, as she said the last, but seemed no less resolute than before.

"He said no one," Harry repeated stubbornly. "And I think he'd still say the same."

Professor McGonagall opened her mouth again, still very angry, but Moody cut in first. "You said Dumbledore had set you a task, Potter," Moody began. "What do you mean by that?"

"There's something I've got to do," Harry replied. "Unfinished business from what we were doing the night that – he died." His jaw was set at a stubborn angle. "And I'm the only one who can do it – well, with Ron and Hermione, anyway – since we're the only people Dumbledore said could know."

"And how, pray, do three seventh-year students propose to finish work that the greatest wizard of the twentieth century could not do himself?" McGonagall asked, sarcasm back in full force. "Alone, without aid from those who would give it?"

"That's why we're doing research," Harry said, his temper – and his voice – rising slightly.

At that moment, Ron and Hermione appeared, coming down from the drawing room where they'd been studying. "We heard voices," Ron explained as they descended.

"We've heard," McGonagall replied, "that you two are planning to follow Potter about in some hare-brained attempt to complete the work of Albus Dumbledore."

Ron and Hermione exchanged nervous glances. "Er, that's true, Professor," Hermione said. "We were planning on helping Harry, because it's more than he can do alone, and he says he can't tell anyone else about it. So we've got to help him, there's nothing else we can do."

"Uh, I don't know if Harry's told you," Ron continued, looking petrified, "but we're – all of us – we're not coming back to Hogwarts next term, because this is going to take a bit longer than the, uh, summer. So."

"My three best Gryffindors are leaving school," McGonagall said disbelievingly. "My brightest student in forty years is going to throw away her entire life, all her chances at success –"

Hermione then did something very brave, Harry thought later. "Professor McGonagall," Hermione began, her jaw just as stubborn as Harry's, "This is more important than anything else. Whether we like it or not, this war hurts everybody. Ron and I, we're Harry's best friends, and Harry has to do things that nobody else can. Some friends we'd be, if we left him when he needed us. I'd rather – rather kiss the hem of Bellatrix Lestrange's robes than leave him, than pretend everything was back to normal and go back to school, while people were _dying_, when I could be doing something to stop that. That's – that's all I have to say."

Professor McGonagall opened her mouth again, though she did look flustered, but Moody spoke up again. "That's a fair enough choice, Minerva," he said gruffly. "An' they're right. These three have seen more action than half the hitwizards in the Ministry, and if they feel this is their war, well, they're probably right. I'll respect your decision, lassie," he said, nodding his head toward Hermione, "but see that you three take care of yourselves."

Hermione bit her lip, looking as if she was going to cry. Ron nodded, very seriously.

Professor McGonagall threw her hands up in the air despairingly. "Well," she said. "Since you've clearly made up your minds – and I know better, by now, than to stand in the way of you three when you're determined," she said with a little sniff, "But I do refuse to let you go haring off without any aid at all from the Order." Harry opened his mouth again to protest, but McGonagall held up a hand to shush him. "No, Potter, listen. I think it's time to bring you into the Order entirely. Heaven knows, you three have practically been members of the Order since it resumed – you've seen battle twice, heaven help me."

Moody looked doubtful. "Minerva, I think you're being hasty. After all, we don't know if –"

"Oh, of course it is, Alastor," McGonagall said with a wave of her hand. "We have to ask, of course, but do you really think they'll all say no? In any case, you three shall sit in on the meeting tonight. I'll need you, Potter, to tell us all everything you can of what _happened_ that night, what you saw, since you were in the center of it all."

Harry looked and felt a little doubtful, but nodded. He was pleased that McGonagall was bringing them into the Order in full, or wanted to at any rate, but couldn't help but feel that it was _about time_, after all.

"Weasley, does your _mother_ know about you leaving school?" Professor McGonagall said suddenly. "And you, Hermione?"

"Er," Ron said a little shiftily. Hermione just blushed.

"I see," Professor McGonagall replied, tight-lipped. "You'd best see to that tonight, then, Ronald. And you, Hermione. Write to your parents."

"Yes, Professor," Hermione said, though Harry thought he saw something odd in her eyes.

"I'm going to get things ready at any rate," Professor McGonagall said, shrugging off her tartan wrap, which she hadn't taken off since she'd arrived.

"I'll help," Hermione said.

"And me," Ron echoed.

"No, I'll see to it. You three go… research," McGonagall said with a wave of her hand.

Harry suddenly remembered what he'd found, and he jerked his head to signal that they should go upstairs. Looking a little surprised, Hermione and Ron followed after him as he dashed up to his room – Sirius's room.

Once they were all inside, and Harry had cast _Muffliato_ so that he could be sure of no-one eavesdropping, he started to tell them. Phineas Nigellus, he noticed, was no longer in his portrait.

"I've found R.A.B.," he said excitedly. "I've _found_ him!"

"But how can you have?" Hermione said, looking doubtful and a little put-out that Harry had beaten her to the punch. "I mean, you've just been sitting in here."

"Exactly," Harry said, still feeling terribly excited. "Look – Phineas Nigellus, the portrait of the old Headmaster, well, he's a Black, right? And he's got a portrait in here, too, not just in Dumbledore's office. And anyway, he was telling me, right, that this used to be Sirius's room? And he said that there's this spot in the room where Sirius, and all the other boys who used to have this room, carved their initials. So I was looking at it, right? And Sirius is there, and a bunch of other people off that family tree – and, get this, there's an R. A. Black. _Regulus_ Black. Regulus _Arcturus_ Black. Can you believe it?"

Hermione's eyes were wide, and Ron looked just as surprised, too. "But how can you know for sure?" Ron asked, though he sounded excited.

"No, but it's perfect, Ron," Hermione said. "Regulus was a Death Eater, wasn't he? Only didn't Sirius say that he was killed because he'd gotten in deeper than he'd wanted to, and couldn't do all the things that Voldemort told him? Well, maybe it had something to do with the horcruxes!"

"Only I don't think it can have," Harry said slowly, thinking it over. "Because if Lord Voldemort knew – I mean, if he'd known the horcruxes were being tampered with, he'd have found the false locket first, wouldn't he? So Regulus must have been killed for something else, don't know what. Maybe he really _did_ get killed by somebody minor, for objecting to something else."

"Yeah, maybe," Ron said. "Harry – do you know what this means, mate?"

"What?"

"The horcrux – the locket – it's probably _here_. In Grimmauld Place."

"Yeah," Harry breathed. "Unless Regulus took it somewhere else. I mean, it could be anywhere."

"Where better than here, though?" Ron objected. "I mean, there's loads and loads of Dark Arts stuff here, they'd probably never notice another locket or whatever lying around."

Harry's face went pale. "But Sirius cleared everything out when the Order restarted," he said nervously. "We all helped him, remember? Cleaning everything out?"

"What did he _do_ with it all?" Hermione asked nervously. "He can't have –just thrown it away, can he? That stuff is dangerous, you couldn't just put it in a trash bin where anyone could come along and take it."

"Or where Kreacher could get at it," Harry said darkly.

"We'll have to ask McGonagall where it all went," Hermione decided.

"Yeah, maybe, but not now," Harry decided. "She's busy at the moment."

They all decided to ask her later, maybe after the meeting, and then Hermione became very nervous, and glanced at Ron a little shyly, and said that she'd best change for the meeting if they were all to attend, and she glanced down at the pair of faded jeans she'd been wearing all day and then left the room quickly.

Ron and Harry changed, too, and then had a long chat about nothing in particular, which was surprisingly normal. Harry couldn't concentrate on anything, and spent the last half-hour before the meeting just pacing up and down nervously. It was all too much to bear.

At 9:24, Hermione popped her head into the door to say that she thought she could hear people arriving downstairs. Harry noticed with some surprise that she'd done her hair up into a knot at the back of her head, and that her robes seemed to be – different. Ron noticed, too, and looked at her with obviously pleased surprise, before taking her hand again.

Harry knew they'd been a little different since Dumbledore's funeral, and they'd snuck off for some time alone at Privet Drive, but just the way they took hands as if they'd been doing it for years surprised him every time he saw it.

And then they went downstairs.

People were arriving quickly, now, hanging their cloaks up in the hallway. Harry realized with a jolt that Mrs. Black no longer screamed invectives when people walked in the door. She seemed to spend a lot of her time facing the other way in the portrait, her back turned to the world. Harry felt a little sorry for her, and then wondered why he even bothered.

The meeting was down in the kitchen, and Harry followed Tonks and Kingsley Shacklebolt downstairs – they seemed to have come off-duty together – and were followed after by Dedalus Diggle and Elphias Doge, who seemed to be good old friends. McGonagall and Moody were already down there, as were Fred and George, Charlie Weasley – Harry hadn't seen him in years – and Hestia Jones.

In the next ten minutes, everyone seemed to arrive. Molly Weasley didn't bother to sit down when she came in with Arthur, instead heading straight to the stovetop, where she put on a kettle to boil for tea, saying more to herself than anyone else that people would want something hot to drink as the evening wore on.

And when everyone – even Aberforth Dumbledore – had arrived, Minerva McGonagall called the meeting to order.

"Good evening, all, and thank you for coming. Before I address the subject at hand, I should let you know that Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, and Hermione Granger are here at my invitation, though they are not at this time members of the Order." She paused, and surveyed the room.

"Now. As you all know by now, the Order of the Phoenix is in the gravest danger since its inception in 1969. We are faced with two very dire problems: our leader, Albus Dumbledore, is dead," and here she paused, her throat tightening audibly, tears pricking at her eyes, "and Severus Snape has proven himself a traitor, putting much of the Order into very grave danger - perhaps even down to our choice of location."

She paused to catch her breath, surveying the crowded room, looking to Alastor Moody as if for support, which he gave in the form of a small nod of approval. "So we have before us a terrible question: what is the future of the Order? With Albus Dumbledore - gone - shall we still exist as one band of brothers, so to speak, and if so, in what manner shall we organize? I leave this meeting open to discussion."

There was a very long pause. Then Tonks stood to address the room. She'd been sitting next to Remus Lupin, who looked very weary, but who followed Tonks with his eyes when she moved as if he couldn't help watching her.

"I don't think there's any question of it," Tonks said plainly. "The Order stays – stands – together. As for security and everything else, that can be addressed, but the Order of the Phoenix can't just dissolve now. The world _needs_ us. Azkaban Prison fell on the first. We _know_ the Death Eaters assembled on the fifth – we've been watching the Malfoy Manor, something was going on there – and that means danger. People have died and are dying, and if the Order can do anything to fight against that, we'll stand together. Because that's what we've all pledged ourselves to do. And that's all I have to say." She nodded fiercely, her purple hair catching the light, and then, looking nervous as if she hadn't realized anyone had been listening to her, sat down again.

"Well said," Elphias Doge remarked in his wheezy voice. "Dumbledore wouldn't have wanted us to stop. We all can recognize that."

Then Mrs. Weasley spoke, with her teapot in hand. "I – I don't know, with Dumbeldore gone everything seems so strange and wrong. I can hardly imagine the Order without him. But I don't suppose we can give up, can we? Not when there are people out there who need us to keep on going."

Everybody nodded or murmured assent to this, and Minerva McGonagall nodded sharply, before standing again to address the room.

"Well," Minerva said after a pause, "Since we all seem to be in agreement that the Order should not disband - I did not think that of any of you - we must decide what the Order will be, now." Her hands gripped the table tightly as she spoke, gazing around at the assembly. "Albus Dumbledore was our leader, our chief, our captain. It was to him that all of us turned in our times of confusion and need. No one can take his place, but someone or something must fill his role now. Proposals?"

There was a longer pause at this, and people seemed deep in thought. Remus Lupin's brow was furrowed in a worried frown, and Charlie Weasley looked a little lost. That wasn't surprising, Harry thought to himself, given how little he'd been in England, really.

"Well, Minerva," Arthur Weasley said after a pause, "In the best of worlds, I suppose that we wouldn't need leaders, and could work together by consuss, but – how often have we all met together like this? I suppose we do need someone to organize us all, someone to know everything and everyone in the Order. And right now, honestly, the closest person to that is you, or perhaps Alastor."

"I agree with Arthur," Remus Lupin said after a beat. "Minerva and Alastor were closest to Dumbledore, and they'd know best what he wants – wanted – for the Order."

"If it's a matter of someone being close to the Order," began the straw-haired Sturgis Podmore, "I think we're forgetting someone. Aberforth, I know you're here, and even if you've kept much to yourself, I know you knew your brother well, and some of his mind, as much as any of us. Would you consent, Aberforth, to take up his work? And you, Minerva? Alastor?"

They looked a little bit at a loss, and suddenly Hermione spoke up. "It makes sense," she began slowly, looking terrified at actually daring to speak in an _Order_ meeting. "I mean – Professor McGonagall is going to be the Headmistress of Hogwarts now, and Professor – Mr. Moody, er, well I know everyone's always said you were great friends with Professor Dumbldedore, and everyone knows that you're the best there is in the Order for things like – like combat and tactics, and Mr. Dumbledore, well, he's Professor Dumbledore's brother."

She took a deep breath, and continued rather in a rush. "And, well, I know nobody can ever be as great a wizard as Professor Dumbledore was again. But maybe _three_ people can be at least a little like him, and these three – Professor McGonagall, Mr. Moody, and Mr. Dumbledore, I mean – well, they make up parts of Professor Dumbledore. And that's all I have to say." She sat down very quickly, and Harry saw Ron take her hand and smile at her in reassurance. She smiled back.

"I'll say it again," said Sturgis Podmore. "Will you do it?"

"I hardly know what to say," began Professor McGonagall. "Well – well, yes, if you'll have me. I'll take this up, with Aberforth and Alastor. I'll try to shoulder the burden with them." She was glowing with pride and humble surprise all at once, and Harry thought with a little surprise that she must have been very beautiful in her youth.

"Aye, I'll do it," said Moody, gruffly. "And Minnie here, she's practically taken up leadership all by herself already."

All eyes turned to Aberforth. Harry noticed that he'd washed for the meeting. He still couldn't quite reconcile the grubby barkeeper as Albus Dumbledore's _brother_.

"I will try to help. It is the last duty I will carry out for my brother." His voice was deep and gravelly, and his blue eyes were very cold. He looked very dangerous, and Harry's respect for him rose slightly.

"If that's taken care of, then," Minerva McGonagall said, still flushed. "And I thank you all – I thank you very much for your trust in me, and in us. There are a few things we need to tackle, now that we've done the hardest, so I'll start with the easiest of what's left first." She looked straight at Harry as she said this, and Harry rather wished he could slide down under the table as all eyes followed hers.

"Harry Potter, Ronald Weasley, and Hermione Granger have informed me that the three of them intend to leave Hogwarts forever, as they complete a task that Albus Dumbledore set them before he died. They also maintain that this task is so secret that they can repeat it to no one. While I disagree," and here she looked very sharply at Harry, "that something of this nature should be kept so secret, I urge the Order to stand behind these three young people, and indeed, to bring them into the fold. If we cannot aid them directly, we can at least support them with the full might of the Order."

Immediately, everyone began talking at once. Molly Weasley opened her mouth first in objection, and over the rumble of conversation taking place around the room, Harry could hear her shouting at Ron, "Ronald Bilius Weasley, you are in no way, shape, or form giving up your education like this! I _forbid_ you to throw away everything! You can't put yourself in danger like this, you're too young!" And so on, and so on. Ron gritted his teeth and didn't look at his mother directly, his arms crossed.

When the volume of conversation in the room died down somewhat, Ron stood up. "Mum," he said, looking directly at his mother, "This is something I have to do. I'm of age now, like Fred and George, and I'm leaving school because this is more important. Maybe I can finish my education some day, I don't know, but for now this is what I have to do."

Hermione stood too, putting a hand on Ron's arm. "I say the same."

Finally, Harry stood. "I'm not of age yet," he admitted, "But we've got to do this. If you'll have us, I'll be grateful, but even if you won't help me we're going to do this. We're the only ones who can."

Molly Weasley protested again. "You're too young, all of you! This is something for adults. Wait just one more year, and then start, but for Merlin's sake let yourselves grow up for one more year!"

"I've been fighting in this war since I was one year old," Harry said stubbornly, not quite looking her in the eyes. "I met Voldemort for a second time," and he didn't pause at the winces, gasps, and groans about the table at the name, "when I was eleven, and I've faced him three other times. And you know what? I'm going to have to face him again and again until he's dead, because I'm the one who has to deal with _him_. And I can't just wait another year, because by then he could have killed more people, he could have killed all of you just like he's killed Amelia Bones and Emmeline Vance and like he had Dumbledore killed, and I've got to do this."

Remus Lupin stood to speak, and he looked tired, and pained. "Harry is right," he said to all around. "How old were many of us when we joined the Order. I was just eighteen. Sirius joined the summer after seventh year. Lily and James joined just after they became engaged, and their wedding date was Lily's nineteenth birthday. I know others here joined when they were little older than these three, because it was _their war_ already. It is all of our war, and these young people have no less right to fight than any of us. Harry especially faced more than most grown wizards before he was thirteen. Hermione and Ron have been with him almost every step of the way. They deserve to fight as much as any of us, and more than some." He didn't look at anyone specifically when he said this last, but there were a few uncomfortable glances about the table, and Harry noticed Mundungus Fletcher and Hestia Jones looking particularly uncomfortable.

Molly was sobbing now. "Am I to send all of my family off to fight in this war?" she gasped. "I lost my brothers – they were just twenty-three! My husband and my oldest son have nearly died! My little girl, Ginny, was nearly murdered in her _first year_. How many times to I have to see my children – my babies –" And she began to cry too hard to speak.

Bill spoke, his voice thick and muffled, his face still heavily bandaged. "I still fight, because I have to, and because if I don't, we _will_ all die. If we fight, we've still the chance to live. That goes for all of us. That goes for Ron, too, Mum, and for Harry. I don't like it, but I understand it."

Arthur spoke, finally. "I have never been able to keep my sons for standing up in what they believe in. It is a measure of their character, and though I fear for them, I know that it is their choice, and not mine, about what dangers they'll face."

Hestia Jones stood, looking nervous. "Well – I've not much to say, but it's just this. People say that Harry Potter is the Chosen One, and I believe them. I believe in him. And I think that it's wrong for us, for the Order, the people who have sworn to defeat you-know-who, not to give support to the only person with a real chance of defeating this evil, even if he cannot reveal everything to us at all times. He is the Chosen One. I stand behind him."

Harry felt himself flushing scarlet. It was all very well for her to support him, but to put it like that! He felt rather as if he could sink into the floor and never get up again, gladly.

The debate continued on, Molly Weasley voicing periodic objections based on their age, Kingsley and Remus debating whether or not Harry really was the Chosen One, and if so, did that make a difference, since he was underage; and so on.

Finally, McGonagall called for order. "We'll put it to the vote. In the old days, Albus would have had the final say, but he is not here and cannot tell us his mind."

They voted, simply raising their hands to be counted. Harry held his breath.

It was narrow, but the vote was in their favor; and when all hands had been tallied, McGonagall said, "We will induct them at the end of the meeting properly, but for now, we should deal with our other business." There was some further murmuring, and Molly Weasley glared daggers at Remus and Tonks, who had voted for Harry, Ron, and Hermione's inductions.

Moody stood up to speak. "Dumbledore is dead," he said frankly. "He was our Secret Keeper, and he did not end the Fidelius Charm before he died. That means that no one else will be able to be brought into the Order if we continue to use Grimmauld Place as Headquarters. It also means that Severus Snape can still gain entry at any time, and that he may in fact have been here since Albus's death. I think it's clear that we'll have to move."

There was an uproar. Sturgis Podmore was loudly proclaiming that the obvious solution was to relocate to Hogwarts, Minerva was refusing loudly on the grounds that it was nowhere near secure enough, Moody was shooting down every suggestion that Tonks and Kingsley made as too obvious a target for the Death Eaters, and on, and on.

Harry, Ron, and Hermione exchanged glances. Suddenly, Harry made up his mind. He stood to speak, and the room turned to look at him. It was weird, he thought, how people would silence themselves to hear what he, a sixteen-year-old boy, had to say. But then again, Harry thought bitterly, he was the Chosen One.

"If Snape were dead," Harry said flatly, not letting any emotion creep into his voice, "Would we still be able to use the Order as headquarters?"

It was Moody who answered first. "There'd still be the problem of bringing in new people, laddie. Not to mention that Snape is sure to have told all the Death Eaters where we're meeting, anyway."

"Kreacher probably has already," Harry said, his voice still flat. "And I don't think the Order should bring anyone new. Anyone who doesn't already know about the Order, I mean," Harry clarified. "Because the next person could be a Death Eater spy the way Snape was. It's not safe to have too many people know too much information."

There were some murmurs of assent, but most people still looked unconvinced. "There's still the problem of finding Snape, Harry," Remus said in his low, calm voice. "We know he's no longer in his home at Spinner's End, which means he's almost certainly at the Malfoy Manor with all the other fugitive Death Eaters. Which means, of course, that to get to Snape we'll have to get into the Malfoy Manor."

More murmuring, this time fearful. "We'd need to, anyway," Harry said, his arms crossed against his chest. "If we know where the Death Eaters are, that's where we have to attack them." And then he sat. He'd said everything he meant to say, and he didn't think there was anything else he could say to convince anyone.

Hermione looked petrified. "Harry, how are we _going_ to kill Snape, even if we do find him? I mean, he killed Dumbledore! He's got to be fantastically powerful, if even V- Voldemort couldn't do that!"

"He's a coward," Harry growled. "And if Dumbledore hadn't been – if Dumbledore had been all right – Snape would never have been a match for him. The bastard killed a dying man. What does that prove?" But Hermione, Harry knew, was right. Snape always had the best of him, with his legilimency. Snape had dealt with him like a child, and had _let_ him live so that the Dark Lord could kill him later at his pleasure.

This time the debate was fierce. Some were advocating a complete abandonment of Grimmauld Place, more were arguing that none of them alone were a match for Snape and the risk of going after him was too great, and others still were debating methods of capturing and killing the Death Eater.

And then, suddenly, there was a sound from above, as the doors – enchanted to ring whenever anyone entered – opened to let in someone else. There was only one person not at the long wooden table who could enter Grimmauld Place, Harry thought with a chill of horror.

He was not the only one to realize the identity of the intruder. He'd barely leapt up with his wand drawn before Moody, Tonks, and Kingsley were dashing up the stairs, Hestia Jones and Minerva McGonagall hot on their heels. Determined not to be left behind, Harry ran after them, and he heard Ron and Hermione follow.

It felt like ages, but in only a few seconds he, and half the Order, stood face to face with Severus Snape, silhouetted against the open door, his cloak down to reveal a rain-soaked face and the all-too-familiar malevolent black eyes.


	6. Chapter Five

**Author's Notes:** Thank you very much to my reviewers, whose input has directly influenced this chapter. Specifically, I've changed some throwaway information on Dumbledore's portrait mentioned in the fourth chapter (watch for that chapter's edit and update in a few hours), and by doing so, in fact managed to unsnarl a problem in my plot, as you'll see in this chapter.

* * *

**Chapter Five: A Traitor's Court**

10:39 p.m., June 8, 1997

With a roar of unthinking rage, Harry raised his wand. Snape had no time to react to the silvery bolt of _something_ Harry sent streaking toward the Death Eater.

But something else did: in an instant a flash of gold and red plumage shot through the doorway, and Harry saw the wings of a great bird arch up around the Death Eater's face like a halo before, a moment later, the unknown spell struck the bird's breast.

As the bird crumpled, the three Aurors shot off Stunners nearly simultaneously, and Snape had no time to react to all of them. Moody's spell slipped past the intruding wizard's shield, and Snape fell also.

There was instant confusion. Only a few seconds had elapsed, Harry realized, and more than a few of those assembled had yet to understand all that had happened. While Hagrid shouldered Snape's limp body, Harry dashed forward to where Fawkes – the bird had, of course, been a phoenix – now lay. In a smoldering pile of ashes struggled forth a tiny chick, nearly naked. Harry cupped the hatchling protectively in his hands, and felt the little bird press against the warmth of his body.

Behind him, Harry heard a deep, guttural voice say, "Well. Looks like we won't have go to searching for him, after all." It was Aberforth, and Harry could not read the man's face.

When Harry descended a moment later, he found the kitchen in pandemonium. Snape had been unceremoniously thrown into a chair at the end of the long wooden table, and Tonks and Kingsley were busy binding him with ropes and chains and other charms, until only his head was free.

Moody, meanwhile, and Hestia Jones, and Remus Lupin and Sturgis Podmore and Dedalus Diggle, were all engaged in furious conversation. "Well, what do you propose we do with him?" Moody snarled at Sturgis.

"You can't just kill him like that!" Hestia bawled at Moody. "He's an unarmed prisoner, it would be tantamount to murder!"

"He _is_ a murderer," Lupin snarled. "And no doubt more than once since his reform." The werewolf imbued the last word with a hatred more vicious than Harry could quite believe from so gentle a man. "Where was he at the Department of Mysteries? Why did he wait so _long_ to fetch help, to alert the Order? And you, Hestia – have you never wondered who it was who betrayed Emmeline? It had to be someone in the Order, and now we know _who_."

"He might deserve to die, Lupin," Sturgis Podmore barked in reply, "But he's too valuable to kill – you-know-who will want him back, surely!"

"He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named does not pay ransom," Moody growled. "He kills the guards if the prisoner lives and then the prisoner if there's been treachery. Your family sits on the Wizengamot, Podmore! You should know this!"

"I want him dead," Lupin said flatly. "Traitor's justice."

Moody raised his wand – but with a shriek of horror, Hermione dashed forward in front of Snape's limp form. "No, you can't!" she screamed. "He's got to be sent to the Ministry for trial, you can't just kill him like this!"

"The same Ministry that sent Sirius to Azkaban without trial, and let Lucius Malfoy free?" Lupin spat, raising his wand also. "Get out of the way, you silly girl!"

Hermione stood firm, and Harry felt an echo of sick dread in the pit of his stomach. "That makes us no better than Death Eaters!" she shouted at Lupin and Moody, but Harry could not focus on her words. He'd dashed up to Lupin, shoving down the man's wand arm with the hand not cradling the infant phoenix.

"Professor Lupin," Harry said urgently.

Lupin turned roughly to Harry, his face still ugly with hate. "What?"

"If you kill Snape now, we'll never know why Fawkes protected him," Harry said flatly. "I want to know hwy." That was partly true, of course, but Harry's ears were still ringing with Lupin's command to Hermione, and the sick feeling had not yet left him. "It's temporary mercy, we can give him that." Lupin looked unconvinced, but Harry said, his voice very low, "You're better than this."

McGonagall, meanwhile, had been restraining Moody, and a few moments later, after a brief conference with the ex-Auror and Aberforth, raised a hand for quiet.

"You have chosen me as your leader, and now I beg you to follow where I will lead," McGonagall said quietly. "Those of you who would kill this man now would act precipitously. Before we take any action against Severus Snape, there are a few questions we _must_ ask of him." She paused.

"But he's an Occlumens, we all know that," Lupin said angrily. "And none of us are Legilimens as Albus Dumbledore was – and even he was fooled!"

"We will hold a Traitor's Court," McGonagall said, staring Lupin directly in the eye. To Harry's surprise, the man subsided, looking satisfied. "Some of you here," McGonagall continued, "Will know the customs – Arthur, Molly, Alastor, Aberforth – but for those of you not purely wizarding by blood, I shall explain."

Harry glanced at Ron and Hermione, totally at a loss. Ron had a look of shocked comprehension on his face; Hermione, an irritated frown as if struggling to remember something.

"The Traitor's Court is an ancient rite, pre-dating the Wizengamot by a millennium," Professor McGonagall continued. "The traitor is confronted by those he has betrayed in a ritual circle – he, in the center, bound by fire and water, earth and metal, his wand – wood – suspended in air. Those betrayed form a circle of power and recite the charge of treachery. This will force the traitor's wand to snap, should he give a lie to any question put to him by the assembled Court."

"But Professor!" Hermione exclaimed. "The Ministry outlawed the Traitor's court in 1702! They said it was –"

"Barbaric," Nymphadora Tonks finished, "Because anyone could call a Traitor's Court, outside Ministry control, and the penalty for lying has always been death. The Ministry," Tonks said, lip curling, "prefers the far more civilized Dementor's Kiss."

"We cannot rely on Ministry justice," McGonagall said roughly. "They would not know how to interrogate him, and he would lie with impunity. Traitor's Court defeats even the Occlumens."

Hermione nodded once, firmly. "What do we do?"

The Order moved the table, and all the chairs save Snape's; Molly Weasley collected Fawkes from Harry and swaddled him in blankets heated by a warming charm; Bill began a purification ritual of water and salt, which, he said was traditional when Harry raised an eyebrow at him. McGonagall called for a calligrapher to paint the binding runes.

"I can," Hermione said, raising her hand as if in a classroom."

"Professor Dalecarle always praised your hand," McGonagall said approvingly, and Hermione rushed to paint the runes about Snape's chair. Harry saw, wonderingly, each rune ripple and shine as Hermione finished painting it. The very room seemed to hum, as if the magic in the house had begun to respond to the rite about to take place.

Moody, who had pocketed Snape's wand after stunning the Death Eater, placed the wand directly over the water rune before stepping back into the nascent circle. Harry found himself between Tonks and Hermione. He could feel his heart pounding. They were going to force the liar into some truth-telling.

When Bill had at last finished purifying and had joined hands with Arthur and Charlie, McGonagall raised her wand. "Ennervate," she intoned, with a voice as hard as steel.

Snape woke with a start. Glancing down at his chains, he sneered, "I'd expected you to kill me by now. I suppose one of you had to sit on Potter to stop him."

"I don't think you quite understand your predicament, Snape," Lupin said, his voice light, his eyes shining. Harry saw Tonks, standing next to him, squeeze Lupin's hand encouragingly.

"Severus Snape, you have shown yourself a traitor to the Order of the Phoenix," McGonagall said, her eyes very hard. "By the grace of Albus Dumbledore you first were spared, given mercy you never gave your victims as a Death Eater during the first war. That generosity you repaid with betrayal and murder. Through your collaboration with the Death Eaters – nay, through your open allegiance with He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named – you caused the death of Albus Dumbledore and the grave injury of William Weasley. For your crimes the Order can find no recourse in Ministry justice." She paused. "So we, the Order of the Phoenix, now call a Traitor's Court."

Harry saw with pleasure beads of sweat form on Snape's greasy forehead. The man's face was distorted by an animal grimace of fear and anger. Snape, Harry thought with relish, needed no refresher course on this particular rite.

Without waiting, McGonagall began to chant in Latin. Harry didn't know the spell, but several others did, and they joined in with McGonagall. It was a long incantation, Harry thought, not the simple spells and phrases he'd learned at Hogwarts – it was a ritual, part of a body of magic old beyond measure. Celtic elements and Roman language, British wands and Latin spells – and as Harry listened more intently, he heard the rhythm and repetition. He did not know how long it had been before he, too, could pick up the words to the spell, but he could feel it sweeping him along in a current of power, exhilarating and ancient.

And then – it ended, and Harry looked up to see Snape surrounded by a net of light emanating from the runes, his wand at the zenith of the magical web, floating in mid-air.

"We begin," McGonagall said grimly. "Severus Snape, when did you first betray the Order of the Phoenix to your master?"

"April twenty-first, 1980," Snape said without hesitation. He grimaced at his admission, his face that of a fox at bay. His wand, Harry noticed, remained intact.

"That can't be true," Elphias Doge said indignantly. "You didn't join the Order until –"

"That was when I heard the prophecy," Snape snarled. "The Potters died for it. I count it as betrayal!"

There was utter silence, broken only when Hermione hissed in Harry's ear, "You're crushing my hand!" Harry eased his grip slightly.

"Why did Dumbledore trust you?" Harry snarled. "How could he believe you when you only came crawling back from Voldemort after _MY MUM AND DAD WERE DEAD_?"

"Don't say that name!" Snape roared.

"You're on trial for your life, you murdering bastard, and that's what you're worried about?" Harry replied incredulously. "Answer the bloody question!"

The wand above Snape's head had begun to tremble, and the chained wizard hastened to answer the question. "I cannot believe that is what Dumbledore told you. I 'came crawling', as you put it, Potter, in January of 1981 – and I cannot believe you so imbecilic as to be incapable of simple _math_. Nine months, Potter! Nine months in Dumbledore's employ! That, you fool, is why he trusted me!"

His wand, Harry saw, remained intact.

"That still doesn't mean – that still doesn't change the fact that you killed Dumbledore!" Harry shouted back, still trying to process everything.

"How can that be true?" Lupin frowned. "If you'd joined the Order in 1981, we would have known – we would have known you'd come over, and none of us did." He glanced around the room for confirmation, and McGonagall and Doge and Podmore all looked just as puzzled.

"I was a spy," Snape hissed, "And Albus Dumbledore knew there was a spy for the Dark Lord in your midst. If I had joined the Order openly, I would have been betrayed myself! Think, for the love of Merlin, think! If I had been known to Pettigrew, I would not have lasted a _day_ as Dumbledore's spy!"

An uncomfortable silence descended over the room.

Snape, still furious, twisted his head to stare at Moody. "And you knew that, you bastard! You knew I'd served Dumbledore, you were at my _trial_, and you didn't say a word for me, when Potter's been running around telling everyone that I didn't come back until after the Dark Lord fell. You've never believed anything but the worst of me, and this must have been your vindication, you paranoid old _fool_!"

Moody roared something incoherently angry, but he did not break the circle. McGonagall, still furious, burst in, "We have not given you permission, traitor, to address the Court! You will hold your peace until addressed!"

Snape spat. It did not reach her, of course, but her face went a livid shade of white.

It was Lupin who spoke next, sounding genuinely confused if still angry. "Damn it, then why did Voldemort trust you when you crawled back to _him_ in '95? He must have known you'd been a spy for Dumbledore –"

"Fools, fools," Snape snarled. "I was a double agent, of course I was! I _told_ the Dark Lord in 1981 that I had Dumbledore's trust, because he is a Legilimens and I was not, then, so accomplished as an Occlumens that I could hide long meetings with the head of the Order of the Phoenix. And the Dark Lord believed me his man, his spy – and Dumbledore believed the same. Dumbledore knew that I would sometimes have to reveal information to the Dark Lord, but the Dark Lord _never_ knew that I told truths to Albus Dumbledore, because he would not have permitted it. I was Dumbledore's man in the first war from January twenty-seventh, 1981. And when the Defense post came open in 1981, I applied for it on the Dark Lord's orders, and was not accepted. And when the Dark Lord fell, I took the Potions position, and when he came back, I told him, and he believed me, that I had taken the Potions position only so I could spy on Dumbledore. Think! How will you win this war, you fools, if you do not _think_?"

More stunned silence. "And why didn't you kill Harry?" Hermione said in a rush. "I've always said – I've always defended you to them, that you couldn't have been a spy for V-Voldemort, because you never killed Harry, but we know you're his spy now, so why didn't you?" She stared at him intently, meeting his black eyes with her own brown, as if searching for some proof in them.

"Because, you stupid girl, I do not want him dead," Snape said, and this admission cost him, as if it had caused him bodily pain to admit it. "Potter is the only hope anyone has to defeating the Dark Lord – why would I want him dead?"

"Are you – are you not a traitor, then, Severus?" McGonagall said quietly. Her face was still very pale, but Harry thought he saw hope in her eyes.

"No, Minerva," Snape replied just as quietly, "I am not. I have never betrayed the Order of the Phoenix since becoming a part of it, not without Dumbledore's full knowledge that what I did, I had to do."

"But Emmeline," a voice said from the back, and Harry saw that Hestia Jones was speaking through tears. "She is _dead_. You cannot tell me that Dumbledore let – that Dumbledore let you betray her?"

Snape was very quiet for a moment, but compelled to speak, said, "Dumbledore did not know until too late that I had been forced to give the Dark Lord that information. I was detained, and he had no time to alert her."

"That's all?" Hestia whispered. "That is all? Not a word of regret that Emmeline Vance is _dead_ because of you, not a single word –"

"And how many others have lived because of me?" Snape snarled. "I have saved you fools time and time again, my information has kept you safe, but I cannot always protect all of you! This is a war, some of you will die, and I refuse to let you lay the blame for that squarely at my feet."

"I hate you," Hestia said softly. "I would that you had died instead."

"And I that I had died for Dumbledore, but I did not, and there is still a war to fight," Snape said through labored breathing.

"Why," Hagrid said roughly, his voice aching. "Did ye have ta kill him?"

Snape closed his eyes. "I swore an unbreakable vow to Narcissa Malfoy that if her son did not succeed, I would take his place."

"And that isn't treachery?" Podmore bellowed. "You enter into collusion with the Death Eaters to kill Dumbledore, and you don't think yourself a traitor?"

"I did not know what terms Narcissa Malfoy would name when she asked me to swear!" Snape retorted. "Would you have had me refuse, with that bitch Bellatrix watching and Pettigrew set to spy on me in my own house? She asked me to swear to protect Draco – and I swore at first to find out what she wanted me to protect him from! I told Dumbledore as soon as I was able that I would lay down my life rather than uphold the vow, and he refused. He was dying – did you not know that? – his flesh had begun to _rot_ away, and I knew that when I treated him. He chose to die, and let me continue on as a spy. _That_ is why he gave me the Defense post – the one we all know is cursed, Merlin knows how – because he knew that no matter what happened I could not remain at Hogwarts after this year."

Harry stared. The man's wand was still intact. Snape was telling the truth. "Then that was what it all meant, your argument with Dumbledore," he said wonderingly. "The one were you told him you didn't want to – didn't want to do whatever it was any longer…"

"How did you know about that conversation?" Snape snapped, looking furious. "In your invisibility cloak, no doubt, I've always _told_ Dumbledore you shouldn't be allowed to have one –"

"Er," Harry said, but Hagrid saved him.

"I'm the one as overheard ye, Snape," Hagrid said, sounding none too friendly, though not quite as murderous as Harry had expected. "Shoulda known you were up to sommat fishy."

"That was – private," Snape breathed angrily.

"But you were arguing with him, weren't you?" Harry continued. "About the vow, weren't you?"

"Yes! Yes, Potter, about the vow! I told him that I was ready to die, that the Order needed him more than me, but Dumbledore insisted, and I could not disobey him. I did not want to, but I _obeyed_.

"And Draco Malfoy," McGonagall said coolly. "Potter insisted all this year that he was involved in the attacks – and I do apologize, Harry, for disbelieving you. And if you knew that Malfoy had been ordered to kill Albus, knew he was a Death Eater – why did you not alert the Order of the night he'd decided to break open Hogwarts to the Death Eaters?"

"Because Draco Malfoy is an idiot taught to hate me by his Aunt Bellatrix," Snape growled, "And a _very_ accomplished Occlumens for his age." This last was directed at Harry, who refused to flush. "He did not wish to tell me because he wanted the glory all to himself."

"Funny," Harry said, furiously, "How _Malfoy_ who wanted to be a Death Eater couldn't manage to kill anyone, and you _could_."

"Draco Malfoy is a child," Snape replied angrily. "Who was told that if he did not succeed, his mother and father would be killed by the Dark Lord. Fenrir Greyback kept in his mother's home as a threat, his father in Azkaban – the boy had no way out!"

"You still care about him, don't you!" Harry yelled. "You know what happened that day you found us in the bathroom, _Professor_? He tried to put me under the Cruciatus Curse!"

"I _know_," Snape growled, "But Albus Dumbledore thought there was something in him worth saving, and so did I."

There was silence.

"Does anyone have anything left to ask?" McGonagall said quietly. "Because if not, I believe this Traitor's Court can be adjourned."

"I do," Harry grunted after a moment. "Fawkes. Why did he help you?"

"Because that was Albus Dumbledore's will," Snape replied flatly. "And Fawkes' last favor to him."

"But," Harry said, confused. "Dumbledore can't give any orders now, seeing as he's _dead_."

"But he has a portrait," Snape replied calmly. "And Fawkes has a will of his own."

"Enough," McGonagall said roughly, pulling her hands free from Moody and Aberforth. The circle of power broken, the runes faded away, and Snape's wand clattered onto the wooden floor.

"Moody, release him," the Transfiguration Professor said. "It is clear to me – and to everyone else here, I have no doubt – that this man is innocent of treachery."

Slowly, Moody complied, looking less than elated. When done, Snape stood, slowly, and retrieved his wand.

"Why did you come here tonight?" Lupin asked, suddenly. "Severus. Why, when you knew we thought you had betrayed us?"

"Because Dumbledore died so that I could continue to be the Order's spy," Snape spat out. "What good is the spy if his information goes nowhere?"

Harry remembered something, suddenly. "Professor – Snape –" He struggled for a suitable term for the man.

"Yes, Potter, what do you want?" Snape said with a sneer. "Believe it or not, I have information that might be of use to the Order of the Phoenix."

"Which I'm a part of, now," Harry said roughly. "I had a dream, another dream like the ones I had in my fifth year. Only this was about you."

Snape was paying attention, now. "Dumbledore told me those had stopped," he said, looking confused. "The Dark Lord had decided to block you out of his mind because of the risk."

"I saw – I saw Voldemort and Bellatrix Lestrange, talking. He doesn't trust you. Voldemort. It was – it was right after some kind of meeting, and Bellatrix was angry, she was furious, and he was consoling her by saying that he wanted her to – to spy on you."

Everybody was listening now, not just Snape. "When did you have this dream, Potter?" Snape asked quietly, still massaging his wrists from where he had been bound.

"Today," Harry breathed. "This morning."

"That can't be possible," Snape said flatly. "The Dark Lord called us together on the fifth."

"Well, that's what happened," Harry said stubbornly. "And I thought you should know."

Snape looked genuinely worried. "This is deliberate," he said at last. "The Dark Lord chose to let you see this, Potter. And I want to know why."

Harry shrugged. "Well, I don't know. But I thought you should know that you're in danger."

"Snape," Moody growled, from where he stood against the wall, his arms crossed. "You said you had information for us. Well?"

"My information, Moody," Snape hissed, "Concerns a change in the Dark Lord's tactics. He has reshuffled the Death Eaters following the Azkaban Breakout. And he has named me his top lieutenant, replacing Bellatrix Lestrange and demoting her from his inner circle."

"So that's why she was so angry!" Harry breathed in sudden comprehension.

Snape made no acknowledgement. "And apart from that, he's decided to take much more direct action. He's done with random strikes and quiet assassinations. He's decided to bring open warfare to the outlying settlements in the country. Any town with three or fewer wizarding families is at risk – and any family that's ever shown itself opposed to him especially. I don't know who he's chosen to strike first, but I'll send word as soon as I do. I can't come often – the Dark Lord has set spies on me – but I will be in communication as frequently as possible. If you can, alert the Diggories, Augusta Longbottom, the Moons, the boots, Griselda Marchbanks, and any of you who live in the country, be on the alert. I – I am afraid I will likely be at any attack," he said with some effort. "He has changed my obligations along with my rank. Bellatrix Lestrange had charge of the Dark Lord's warriors, she led combat operations. And that is now my post."

"What do you plan to do about that?" Aberforth Dumbledore said, speaking for the first time since Snape's capture. He had not spoken once during the trial, Harry realized.

"I will do my best to minimize damage," Snape growled. "I am the Order's spy. I must maintain my cover if I am to continue to serve as the Order's spy. And that means I must be the Dark Lord's Death Eater. I cannot use the excuse any longer to the Dark Lord that I would break my cover by killing visibly, as he no longer thinks I serve the Order. So I will have to kill."

Aberforth stared at Snape, who could not meet the man's eyes. "I hope," Aberforth said quietly, "My brother was right to die for you."

Little was said after that. Snape left quickly, informing McGonagall that he would be missed before long – he'd conjured some kind of simulacrum, but it would only last a few hours – and departed. People were exhausted. Hestia Jones had been weeping steadily since the end of the Court, and Tonks had been trying, without avail, to console her. Moody and McGonagall had a very quiet, very furious argument, and from the snatches Harry overheard, it seemed to be about Snape's trial in the Wizengamot. Molly Weasley and Arthur were talking in hushed voices about security at the Burrow.

Harry, Ron, and Hermione pulled up a few chairs to one side of the room, and had a talk. "Well," Harry said.

"Don't blame yourself, mate, for thinking he was guilty," Ron said forcefully. "Dumbledore didn't explain himself properly to you, and Snape's always going to be a murdering bastard no matter who he works for."

Harry shook his head, not quite consoled. "I suppose," he said, "But – Ron, Hermione, I would have killed him if I could. Lupin would have killed him. And it would have been murder."

Hermione nodded, slowly. "But Harry, you helped calm Lupin down. And you acted in the heat of the moment. Nobody can blame you after what you'd seen Snape do."

"He hated my parents," Harry said, ashamed to feel tears pricking in his eyes. "He hated them, and he gave them away to Voldemort. I don't care who he's working for, I'm never, ever going to forgive him for that. Once the war's over, we have a score to settle." He clenched his wand as he said this, his knuckles going white.

"We need to get some sleep," Hermione said firmly. "We have a lot to talk about tomorrow, what with – well, R.A.B." This she said in a hushed whisper, and Harry remembered his excitement and elation only a few hours before.

"I'm going to go talk to Mum," Ron said, standing suddenly. "I need to make things right, in case – well. I don't want this to be like Percy."

Harry and Hermione watched him as he approached Molly, who had been leaning against the kitchen sink, her head in her hands. Ron patted her gently on the back, and she looked up at him, tears in her eyes. Harry looked away. He had the feeling that this was very private.

Then something came to him in a rush, and he cursed himself for having been so stupid as to overlook it. He got up suddenly, leaving Hermione looking very confused.

"Professor McGonagall," he said urgently, interrupting her argument with Moody.

"What is it, Potter?" she snapped. "Can't it wait?"

"Professor, Dumbledore's portrait, when can I see it?"

"What ever do you mean?" she said, frowning.

"I want to ask him whether I can tell the Order about the – about what we were doing the night he died."


End file.
